


The Ocean's Gift

by Northern_Lady



Series: A Sea of Melancholy [2]
Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Consequences, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Foster Care, Hugs, Love, Mermaids, Mutation, Past Abuse, Sappy, powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-28
Updated: 2018-11-28
Packaged: 2019-09-01 19:30:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16771423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northern_Lady/pseuds/Northern_Lady
Summary: Logan had stopped wondering if he had a mermaid child until one day she showed up at Xavier's School.





	The Ocean's Gift

It had been three days since she arrived and Logan still didn’t know what to say to her. He sat in the cafeteria across from the new student and tried once again to figure out the words that needed to be said. They still wouldn’t come to him. He had never been one for words but this was worse than ever. Hank took a seat at his side and nudged him with his elbow as if to remind him to stop being such a pussy and say something. 

“I will, just be patient,” Logan said aloud to him, irritated. 

“It would be unfair not to,” Hank said matter of factly. 

“You don’t gotta tell me that. I know,” Logan said. 

Logan waited until most of the people at his table had finished their meal and left before he finally spoke to the thirteen year old girl in front of him. She had dark brown hair with lots of green highlights in it. According to Hank the green of her hair was not a dye but a naturally occuring color for this girl. 

“How you like the school so far, Christine?” he asked just as she looked like she was nearly finished with her supper. 

She shrugged her shoulders, barely looking up at him. “It’s fine I guess.” 

That’s all she had to say about it. This was proving to be a lot more difficult than he had hoped. “You making new friends?” he continued, almost sure that she wasn’t making friends. He hadn’t seen her hang around anyone in particular. She had been very quiet and had kept to herself since the moment she arrived. 

“Not really. It’s fine though. Friends are stupid.” She pushed a strand of spaghetti around in her plate with her fork, never bothering to eat it. 

“So you remember that DNA test you had when the social worker dropped you off? The one that was supposed to tell us about your mutation?” Logan asked her as casually as he could. 

“Yeah, what about it?” Christine sounded a little worried. 

“Well Doctor McCoy learned a lot about your aquatic abilities with that test but he learned something else from the test too,” Logan told her, finally getting to the difficult part. “He learned who your father is.” 

She looked up from her plate at him, brown eyes meeting his, mildly curious about this news. Her curiosity quickly turned to anger. “Why should I care who my father is? He couldn’t be bothered to take care of me my whole life.” Christine was pushing back her chair, her long green and brown hair fell into her eyes as she did. “Whoever he is, I don’t want to know!” She said as she left the table. 

Logan let out a sigh as he watched her go. That hadn’t gone well. That hadn’t gone well at all. 

***

Logan sought out Christine late that evening. He found her in the common living room. She had fallen asleep curled up in a bean bag chair with a book in her lap. He barely knew her but she seemed like a good kid. She hadn’t deserved to grow up without a father but that hadn’t been entirely his fault. The mermaid that had been her mother had tricked him in a way. Well, she had saved his life and then asked a reward actually. Even if she hadn’t tricked him, he really had no way of claiming Christine as his own when she had been found as an infant on the beach so many years ago. He couldn’t claim a daughter he hadn’t known existed. It was only a coincidence that he ever discovered his daughter at all. A social worker had brought a mutant orphan foster child to the school because her foster parents were afraid of her. Hank had tested her on arrival and because he had studied Logan’s DNA in the past he recognized Christine’s relation to him. Logan watched her sleep a minute longer and then he went to her and put a hand on her shoulder. 

“Hey kid,” he said gently. 

She startled a little on waking. 

“It’s alright kid. I just thought you might rather sleep in a real bed than on this bean bag thing.”

Christine gave him a funny look as she started to get up. “I’ve slept worse places,” she commented under her breath. 

“Like where?” he asked, not really caring for her attitude but also curious about her history. 

“Sometimes when I’d run away from my foster homes I’d just sleep wherever. Under a bridge, behind a dumpster, on a park bench, maybe in the woods. A bean bag’s really not so bad.” 

“How many foster homes did you have?” he found himself concerned. For some reason he had assumed there had just been one, the one she came from before coming to Xavier’s. “Why did you run off?” 

Christine shrugged her shoulders in response. “I don’t know.” 

“You don’t know how many or you don’t know why you ran off?” he asked. She was a little frustrating sometimes. 

Christine started at him a moment as if he were crazy. “Why do you care?” 

He almost told her right then that he cared because he was her father but he was pretty sure that she wouldn’t believe it if he did tell her. She would believe the DNA part but not the part about him caring. “Just trying to make sense of one of my students is all.” 

She got to her feet and regarded him a little longer. “It’s not just the students who don’t make sense.” She moved towards the door then stopped. “Goodnight Mr Logan.” 

“Goodnight Christine,” he said, kicking himself as he watched her go again still not having told her the one thing she needed to know. 

***

The following morning Christine slept through breakfast. Logan didn’t see her until lunch. She sat at the far end of the table he sat at. Hank took a seat next to Logan. 

“You didn’t tell her yet, did you?” Hank said, seeing how Logan still watched Christine with worry in his features. 

“She doesn’t want to know,” Logan told him. “I told her your test revealed who her father is and she doesn’t want to know.” 

“Probably because she fears that her father will be worse than her foster families were,” Hank made a guess. 

“Yeah, you know anything about that? About her foster families? She mentioned running away…” 

“The social worker who brought her said there had been multiple foster homes and most of the placements ended when Christine ran away. Most adults who find children on the streets are unwilling to just leave them there so she always ended up placed back in the foster system. The social worker didn’t explain why Christine ran away from her previous homes, only that her current family was afraid of her powers and that she doubted the system could help Christine as well as Xavier’s school could,” Hank explained. 

“Huh,” Logan said glancing at Christine again. 

“You really need to tell her. Maybe she doesn’t want to hear it but she needs to know. It might be the only piece of information that keeps her from running away from this school.” 

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Logan admitted. 

“Would you prefer I tell her for you?” Hank said as an offer to help. 

“No I’ll do it. I just gotta wait for the right time.”

“There is no right time and the longer you wait the more chance she’ll be upset that you kept this news to yourself.” Hank reminded him. 

“Good point. Fine, it happens tonight.” 

***

Logan found Christine in the library that night. She wasn’t asleep. She sat on one of the sofas reading. He took a seat next to her without a word, still unsure how to begin. 

“So about that DNA test…” Logan finally made himself say. 

Christine closed her book and met his eyes, understanding dawning on her. “It’s you?” 

“Yeah…” Logan admitted uncomfortably. 

A hundred emotions crossed Christine’s face, everything from anger to worry to relief. She didn’t know what to do with what he had just told her any more than he did. Logan reached over and put a hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know you were born. Your mother was a mermaid. She saved my life when I fell in theocean and I only ever saw her one time. If I had known, you wouldn’t have been alone and after this you won’t be again.” 

“So that’s why they found me on a beach? Cause I couldn’t survive in the water back then?” 

“Probably,” Logan said. “Hank seems to think so.” 

Christine got to her feet, pulling free of his hand on her shoulder. “What do you think is gonna happen now? We’re gonna hug and be a big happy family?” she said, angry tears on her face. “I don’t need parents. I don’t want parents. So just...just pretend like this never happened!” 

Logan thought about going after her when she fled the room but decided it would probably better to just give her a little time to adjust to the news. He needed time to make his own adjustments as it was. 

***

For the better part of a week Christine avoided Logan. He made several attempts to talk to her and each time she found a way to evade him. In the end he decided to just let her have her space. It was near the end of the week when Christine came to him and sat down across from him at the supper table. 

“Am I supposed to call you Dad?” she asked, anger in her tone. 

“That’s up to you,” Logan told her truthfully. He wasn’t sure he would adjust to the name so easily anyway. 

“And if I do, what does that mean? Does it mean we have to do family stuff like play board games and have movie nights and live in some stupid house not at the school?” she asked. Her tone was irritated but Logan could smell something dishonest and it took him a moment to realize what that meant. It meant that she didn’t want to admit that she actually wanted those things. 

“I don’t much like board games,” he told her. “A movie night might not be such a bad idea.” 

“Really?” 

“Sure. Why not? You got plans tonight?” 

“No,” Christine said. 

“Good, then you can meet me at seven in the west wing sitting room,” Logan didn’t make it a question. 

When Christine arrived at 7PM she had none of her usual attitude or antagonism towards. Logan was already seated on a couch waiting for her and she crossed the room and sat down next to him without a word. He realized as she sat down next to him that she hadn’t ever sat on his left side before now because if she had he would have noticed the scar under her left ear. She felt his stare and covered the scar with her hand. 

“Someone hurt you?” he asked her. 

She nodded. “A long time ago. What movie are we watching?” 

Logan started the film and the two of them watched in relative silence. 

“Did you actually like that movie?” Christine asked when the romance film had ended. 

“It was alright,” he replied honestly. 

“It was stupid,” she argued. 

“Why was it stupid? It was a pretty typical story from what I saw.” 

“I don’t know anything about typical stories. I just know it was stupid.” 

“Is that why you agreed to this?” Logan asked her. “So that you could argue over my choice of a movie or is there something more going on here?” 

“What’s going on here is that you think typical stories involve a guy and a girl falling in love and their parents don’t approve and blah blah blah they fix everything and live happily ever after. It’s not even realistic.” 

“I said it was typical. I didn’t say it was realistic.” 

Christine just glared at him. “Why are you being nice to me? What do you really want?” 

Logan sighed. He had known this wasn’t going to be easy, this being a father thing but he hadn’t known it would be quite this hard. “Believe it or not, I just want to know my family, same as you.” 

“I never said…” 

“You didn’t have to,” Logan finished for her. “You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t want to try and get along. Look, I get that you don’t really trust me just yet and that’s probably because your life so far has been pretty crappy. But it hasn’t been all sunshine and roses for me either. I’ve been experimented on, made to do things I didn’t want to do. Most of the people I ever cared about are dead. This is a second chance for both of us.” 

Her eyes welled up with tears at his words. “What if it’s too late for that?” 

“It doesn’t have to be unless you want it to.” 

“Then...then what are we supposed to do?” Christine asked, emotion in her tone. 

Logan didn’t really have an answer for that. “I don’t know. It’s kinda too late for me to teach you to walk or read you bedtime stories and I can’t drive you to soccer practice since the field is right outside...what do you want to do? What can I do?”

Christine shrugged, full of confusion. 

“When you were a little kid, I imagine you knew that your foster family was temporary. What was the one thing you wanted out of life back when you were still little enough to hope for it?” he asked, just wanting to get her to reveal what he could do for her. 

Christine bit her lip to hold back the tears. Then she shook her head, angry with herself. “It doesn’t matter now. It’s just something stupid.” 

“It does matter now,” Logan told her. 

Christine sighed. “When I lived with the Calder family they had kids of their own. Their son Gabe was my age, seven, and he used to watch scary movies that his parents didn’t want him watching and then he’d have nightmares. And every time he had those nightmares he’d go to their room and wake them up and one of them would sit with him until he fell back asleep. I had nightmares too and mine weren’t from scary movies. They were just from bad memories of a foster mom who used to beat the shit out of me or a group home where we never had enough to eat.. So I’d wake up from those dreams and find Gabe was asleep on his Dad’s lap in the living room and they would yell at me to go back to bed… so back when I was stupid enough to still wish I had a family, I just wanted someone to hug me after my nightmares…” she admitted, jaw trembling. 

Logan could barely hold back the emotion after what she had just told him. “You still have nightmares?” he asked her, as stoically as he could. 

Christine nodded. 

“Then the next time you do, you come wake me up. We’ll come down here and I’ll stay with you until you’re ready to sleep again.” 

“Really?” The tears she had been holding back began to fall in earnest.

“Really,” he told her firmly. 

Logan walked with her back to her room and stopped outside the door. “Goodnight kid,” he said and he hugged her. She was stiff at first and after a moment she relaxed a little and hugged him in return. When he stepped away there were tears on her face. She brushed them away in frustration. 

“Goodnight...Dad.” 

***  
Three nights later Logan sat alone in the living room watching TV in the middle of the night. Sometimes his own nightmares kept him from sleeping. He wasn’t really paying attention to the show. Christine wandered into the room looking anxious. 

“I tried your room. You weren’t there. I can’t really sleep so…” 

Logan understood that she meant she’d had a nightmare and was too scared to sleep. He could smell the fear on her right then. He moved his arm so that he could hug her. “Come here kid?” 

Christine went to the sofa and came close enough to hug him and rest her head against his chest. He put both arms around her and hef her firmly. Half a minute passed before she burst into tears, into heavy sobs that affected her whole body. He thought about the way she had described her foster brother Gabe and made a decision in that moment to try and give her something she hadn’t specifically asked for but probably needed a great deal. Christine was a small girl, small enough that he could pull her onto his lap, tuck her head under his chin, and just hold her. 

“What did you dream?” he asked her gently. 

“It was the same sort of dream I always have. About being hungry and people hitting me and trying to find safe places to sleep on the streets,” she said in a near whisper. 

“Listen kid…” he told her gently. “No one is ever gonna hit you again, and you won’t have to sleep behind any dumpsters or be hungry ever again. And anytime you have nightmares or just feel scared you come find me. You’re safe now. That’s a promise.” 

It took her a long time to calm her sobs. Her tears ended and she was still trembling. 

“You’re still worried,” Logan said, knowing it to be true. 

“I just hope you’re telling me the truth is all,” she said. 

“I imagine it’s pretty difficult for you to trust me just yet.” 

“I almost can,” she said, one hand clinging to his shirt. “Do you have a sofa at the end of your bed like Storm does?” 

“Yeah,” it wasn’t hard for Logan to guess why she was asking about this. “You can sleep there if you want.”

She nodded still shaken, “I do but not yet. I just want to sit here.” 

Logan was okay with that and in the end the both of them fell asleep where they sat. 

***

Logan woke late the next morning to find that Christine was still curled up against him but was already awake. It was a Saturday morning and the house was quiet. Most everyone was still asleep. 

“You sleep okay?” he asked her. 

She shook her head. “Is it true what Doctor McCoy says? I’m going to have to return to the ocean someday?” 

“Maybe,” Logan had to admit the truth. “But it won’t be for a long time. Mermaids live a long time, something like three hundred years and you got my healing factor too so it might be a long time before that has to happen.”

She sniffled and nodded. 

“Are you worried about going to the ocean?” 

“I love the ocean. I always have. I sort of feel like she is my mother and I belong there. I am only worried that...once I go back there, will I ever see you again?” 

“You will,” Logan said firmly. “My skeleton is too heavy to ever swim but I can come to the beach and you can meet me there. Besides, it’s not gonna happen for a long time. You got nothing to worry about.” 

“I have everything to worry about!” she sobbed her hand tightening its grip on his shirt. 

Of course she did, Logan realized with a sigh. She didn’t have anyone else in her life who cared about her. The mermaids were all strangers to her and probably had an entirely different culture. He hugged her a little more firmly. “Then this is what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna visit the ocean. You already have the ability to breathe underwater. So I’ll get some scuba gear and we’ll go there and we’ll try to find your mother. That way when this change all happens, it won’t be so scary.” 

“But if something goes wrong you could drown,” she protested. 

“I’ll be fine,” Logan argued. “It’s gonna take a few weeks before we get the chance to go and who knows, it might be hard to find the mermaids. It might take several trips.” 

“You’d be risking your life for me,”she countered. “I can’t let you do that.” 

“If I’m gonna risk my life, at least I get to do it for someone I love,” he told her. 

Christine let out a gasp. “You…?” she couldn’t finish the words. 

“Yeah kid. That’s what I said.” 

“Me too,” she sniffled. 

He didn’t expect her to say it in return. She would when she was ready. Besides she didn’t have to say it for him to know it was true.


End file.
